Telecom unveils ultrafast broadband for consumers

Telecom, New Zealand's biggest internet retailer, has entered the consumer fibre market and says customers will be able to sign up to its ultra-fast broadband plans from tomorrow.

The company said its UFB services will initially be available to only customers in areas where Chorus is rolling out its portion of the country's fibre internet network, which will cover 75 per cent of New Zealand by 2020.

Chorus won the lion's share of the Government's ultra-fast broadband contracts in 2011 and is responsible for building the network in Auckland, Rotorua, Nelson, Wellington and a large chunk of the South Island.

Telecom said it is still running trials with the UFB network builders in areas outside Chorus' footprint (Ultrafast Fibre in the Central North Island, Northpower in Whangarei and Enable Networks in Christchurch).

The company, which has around half of the country's broadband customers, is the first of the big internet retailers to offer services on the UFB network.

When asked this morning when it would offer UFB consumer plans, Vodafone - which merged with TelstraClear last year - could give no update on timing.

A spokesperson said it had been running trials since March last year.

Telecom's entry-level plan costs $95 a month and offers download speeds of up to 30 megabits per second and upload speeds of up to 10 megabits per second.

The data cap in this plan is 50 gigabytes a month, although Telecom does offer more data in some of its more expensive plans.

Telecom's premium plan for $125 a month offers speeds of 100Mb/s down, 50 Mb/s up and a data cap of 50 GB.

The company said it would not initially be imposing these data caps on new customers.

Landline phone rental services, a modem and installation, are included in these plan, which must be signed up to in a 12 month contract.